I'm Sorry
by Indigo Hunter
Summary: No matter what you're gonna build my shell. -Set four years after the movie.- The beautiful cover image belongs to *DestinyBlue on Deviant Art.


**Warning of Doomidy Doom Dooms:** Very mild language and some mentioned violence. Darker than the series.

**I'm Sorry**

Every single time I was left alone with you, I knew for a fact that you were gonna hurt me again.

I was only a kid, a little kid, so I didn't really understand why you did it. All I knew, between yelling at mom and dad and bullying me, is that you were always mad; so, very very mad. What could I have done to deserve it? Your explanation was to toughen me up and make me strong, and that I was too weak as it is... or something along those lines; it changed a lot. Truth be told, at the time, I believed you with my everything.

I was small, even then I was obviously short for my age. Heck, even now I'm probably lucky to stand at a mere _five-foot-two_, being sixteen and all. With you, superiority was based on stature, status, and strength. Of course, you weren't anywhere near stupid either, you knew all the right buttons to press, and the mind games to play to keep me in my place far below you. I was never mentally or emotionally strong, and I'm not afraid to admit that now.

Who could forget my early years? With mom and dad working jobs to get by and pay mortgage, they left you to watch over me and do what you pleased. One wrong step on my part, and you would hurt me again, pounding the confidence out of me and shattering any innocence that was left of my childhood. Sometimes I didn't have to do anything, sometimes you just did it to do it. It hurt a lot, and I almost cried. I would've cried if you weren't there threatening to hurt me even more if I cried.

Despite you being just plain awful to me and doing nothing but hurting me, you were my role model, my _hero_. I admired you through and through. I thought that you beating me was normal, that you did really love me and this happened in everybody's house. Mom and dad never found out about what went on–not because of the fear of you beating me into a bloody pulp–but because I thought it was the typical thing a big brother did. In the end, I think it boils down to the sheer fact that it was all I knew.

While I did find the abuse normal, it wasn't as if I liked it. It hurt, and I hated it. But you said that it would make me better, make me like you. My one dream was to be just like you, and to one day get your respect. I thought if I was strong and tough and just like you, maybe somehow you would be proud of me. Your acceptance was something that I would fight tooth and nail for.

So, naturally, I began to copy the things you did and take interest in all the things you liked. You ended up showing me your magazines, your tapes, and all the gags you would pull. You told me that being mean and a jerk to everybody was the only way to be liked and respected. When I saw that it worked for you just fine, I decided that's how I would act. I didn't really like acting that way, but beneath that little mask of mine was a damaged and motiveless _sheep_ that I would never let _anybody_ see. I wanted to become that mask, make it real.

Remember when you turned eighteen? I can't possibly forget it. Dad happily threw you out the day after, and you set off alone. You already had plans about where you were going, so with the hand-me-down car dad gave you a while back, you drove off far away from Peach Creek. Before leaving, you offered one last smirk and wished me luck without you.

Oh, and in case you didn't know, dad went to a few AA meetings, and stopped drinking. By the time I was nine, he didn't hit me anymore. Mom still parties on weekends, but she doesn't hit me when she drinks, she cries all night long; sometimes she wakes me up and makes me stay up until she's done feeling like crap; her drunken rants typically consist of her failure as a mother. It really sucked when dad drank; I remember he was a jerk to you, and mom and you have always had a bad relationship. I remember. They fight _so much now_, but at least it wasn't as bad as it was when you were around.

Oh, that's right. They don't matter right now. I'm talking about _you_.

I was seven when you left, and I had nothing but that little mask to go on. I tried to perfect it and made it my own, copying the greed you embraced and the selfishness that made up your core. It seemed perfect, it seemed fine. I thought I was doing everything right.

Looking back, I can't help but laugh at how pathetic I was.

It didn't work, I never won. The farther my self-esteem wore down, the more vile I acted. I convinced myself that I was you, and that I was that person now. But, it was never me, and somewhere inside of myself I always knew I was a different person. Someone who wasn't greedy, who wanted nothing more than acceptance and love. The one who had the motivation and drive to try as he might to get it.

For the most part, I was a complete outcast who everybody hated. Eventually, however, I made two friends, both accepting of me despite how I acted. The only way, in my mind, that I could possibly keep these two wonderful people was if I acted like you did. That's how you kept your friends. Sure, everyone else hated me, but maybe if I completely perfected my mask that was solely you would they finally accept me.

As I'm thinking about it, I was a damn fine actor.

Life went on, my mask slipping only for the briefest of moments when I wasn't paying attention. As time ran it's course, the mask slipped off less and less. I acted meaner and greedier as I got more and more desperate for acceptance. In my mind, it was the _only way_.

Then, one day, everything went wrong. It was a day that I will never forget.

My friends and I messed up bad, sending us on a cross-country journey to your place for help to fix it. It was harsh and as my best friend put it, 'unseemly.' Through it, I came close to losing the only two people who ever befriended me. The mask had been glued on that entire time and then some, and I had an artificial confidence upon me.

...Before it came off.

It suffered a big blow halfway through our adventure, but that's not important right now. What is important is when it did come off. When I finally saw you.

I was so naïve, I'm always so naïve. My screwed up mind actually tricked itself into thinking that you would help me. No. You were yourself as usual, the way you'd always been.

The respect I had worked so hard to get had fallen flat on its face. It seemed you had less respect for me now than you ever did. Emulating you had failed even worse, as I realized that I was an exaggerated, strung out version of you at best. All the stories I had made up about you, all the times I built you up to everybody, was effectively destroyed that day.

You beat me, and then my friend; everybody was watching.

I didn't know what to do, so I did the only thing I could do... I smiled. It was probably broken and fake, less real than I was. It was all over, I was beyond humiliated. Nothing could possibly get me away from this hell, the one that had been my life for most of my early childhood. There was nothing left for me. I just _smiled_.

Somehow, though, I was wrong.

Before I knew it, the beating was over. I think I blacked out for a few moments, 'cause what exactly happened to you is a little hazy. What I remember most is me laying on the ground, beaten to a bloody pulp. My best friends were there beside me, seeing if I was gonna be okay. I just couldn't do it anymore, as I laid there helpless, and at that very moment the mask was completely shattered.

Everything I lied about, as well as the truth about me myself, was revealed that day. I knew I didn't deserve my friends, or any friends at that. A loser was all I was, a suck-up loser that could never be liked. I cried, no, I freaking _sobbed_. It was so much ache and pain that I almost couldn't take it. Knowing that I would never be trusted or respected hurt enough, but showing such weakness was _ten times worse_. I could never be healed, never be happy. What kind of person in their right mind would want to be friends with such a nutcase anyway?

Oh, that's right. Turns out I'm surrounded by nutcases.

Why else would they accept me? Yep, that's right, they **accepted **me. They heard what I had to say, by some miracle understood, and _accepted me_. I was going to actually have respect from them. Despite my breakdown, my flaws, and me acting like a selfish fake to get attention, they wanted to be friends with me. How could they possibly understand my situation? Well, I guess they're nicer than I gave them credit for.

And guess what? I did it without you, in _spite_ of you. Turns out that I didn't need you, I never needed you. I could just be myself and get along fine with everybody. I didn't have to put on a ridiculous front to try to impress people. In the end, I think that's what made it even worse for me.

The conclusion is simple. Four years ago, I found out that I didn't need you to be cool. I found out that even though I'm incredibly damaged, I can still, according to people around me anyway, be very likable. I'm healing now, very slowly of course, but I'm getting better everyday. So, as long as I can help it, I will never be fake again.

Here's the part that's quite possibly the strangest: if I hadn't seen you again those four years ago, I would still be wearing that mask. Even worse, I might have eventually _become_ it. If there is anything I can thank you for, it's for the blunt wakeup call that I oh so desperately needed. You helped build my shell, and it was you alone. Then you broke it, just when I thought I was unbreakable.

Be it good or bad, for better or worse, you played a huge part in shaping me into who I am. My life is set, and if you weren't there I wouldn't be the person I am today. Setting aside the beatings, the abuse, the pain... I can't thank you enough for breaking that shell of mine, and setting me on the right track.

It's been a long time coming, and I'm sorry if it angers you, but now I think it's safe to say that I feel **good**.

**~!~**

**Disclaimer:** All the characters mentioned in this story belong to Danny Antonucci. The mentioned lyrics in the summary, and the title of this story comes from the song 'I'm Sorry' by Flyleaf.

**Note of Doomidy Doom Dooms**: Eddy needs moar love. He has like zero centric stories. I've looked EVERYWHERE, but found none. So I wrote this, because Eddy is my favorite and he gets no love and Edd gets all the love and it angers me and makes me sing sad songs and all the love Eddy ever gets is when he is paired with Edd and it's not fair and he has a zillion layers and no one gives him a chance and no one develops his character and no one seems to have seen The Big Picture Show and there are only like four good Eddy fics I have ever read and Eddy has moar potential than people give him credit for and he is awesomer than all of you and EDDY NEEDS MOAR LUVZ. That is all.

~~~from ur frend Bellossomm, also called Oddishh in places, or if you want... _Bethany_


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